More than 180,000 people in the UK could have bought defective wills and have no redress because the will-writers were unregulated, the legal sectors watchdog has warned.
The Legal Ombudsman has said that thousands of wills written each year by non-lawyers may contain errors, leaving people exposed should the will be relied upon.
Last year the ombudsman helped resolve more than 1,000 complaints related to poor will and probate services provided by lawyers and required work to be done to put matters right in two thirds of them.
However, it warned it received far more complaints about unregulated non-lawyers, to which the public has no access in law to the ombudsman.
Chief Legal Ombudsman, Adam Sampson said: “Wills can be prepared by anyone in principle. For people on a budget, this creates headaches about the standard of service one could reasonably expect. It also means some people will have access to help if things go wrong, while others won’t.
The Ombudsman’s report, Complaints in focus: Wills and probate’, recommends a number of ways that the Government could address the problem, including a voluntary ombudsman scheme that unregulated will-writers could choose to join.
It would provide customers with a safety net of up to £50,000 when things did go wrong, Mr Sampson said.
Chairmen of the Society of Will Writers, Nick Honeyman-Brown said: “The society’s overriding objective is for all its members to provide consumers of will writing, trust and estate administration services with the certainty of obtaining a quality product, backed by real consumer protection.
“Working together with the Legal Ombudsman we believe this objective is more likely to be achieved.”